Mikhail Golubev also subscribes to Chris Ward's section (and no others!)

I think the Dragon Site is great the way it is and should be left alone and not diluted. Quality is more important than quantity, and I can say that the Dragon site is definetly the former.  

The Dragon site is full of original analysis, ideas and TN's and has become an invaluable resource and laboratory for many a Dragoneer the World over. So stimulating is the site, that reknowned theorticians often join the debates on the forum, such as Mikhail Golubev and DaCosta Junior to name a couple, and in many cases the topics on the forum often reflect Chris's thought provoking updates.

One also must not forget that Chris Ward is a reknowned expert on the Dragon (So much so, that even other GM Dragon experts sometimes seek his advice on certain lines. Cebalo is one such GM that readily comes to mind), so to water down his site with other Sicilians would only to my mind reduce his effectiveness and appeal.  

Yes it is true that Feds site sucks, but to be fair it cannot be easy to have to cover such wide terrain in perhaps the most complicated opening in chess, after all, thats why they call it the Sicilian Labyrinth. Still it seems to me, as echoed by some of the other posters, that Fed does not lose any sleep putting his updates 
together, although I disagree that he is always late. Admittedly I could be wrong about his tardiness, as to be honest I do not anticipate or monitor his updates that closely, since whether they are early or late the annotations are too flimsy to be of any real benefit to a tournament player. 

It should be noted however, that when GM Paul Motwani ran the also large 1e4 e5 section, he did a fantastic job. He gave repertoire suggestions, original ideas and quality analysis. His Double Trouble (Could also have been named Secret Weapons) site for Gold members was a touch of genius. So while it is challenging to manage a large site effectively, it can be done with planning. One suggestion could be to focus in depth on maybe two Sicilian lines per Update, say the Rauzer and the Schevenigen Keres attack, rather than attempt to cover too many lines at once and do justice to none.

The key is to have a user friendly format that seeks not only to show the latest games, but also to explain and enlighten the subscriber in such a way that he may more readily absorb the ideas and use them successfully in his own games. In this regard I  think that Eric Prie's approach is very interesting and systematic, he focusess on just one variation at a time, at the moment it is mainly the Trompovsky. He analyses one recent main game and then provides supplementary games, also analysed, to reinforce the main ideas he is trying to convey.

To conclude, I would say that if u want to modify the Open Sicilian site in some way that's fine with me, but please do not interfere with the Dragon Site. Remember, if it aint broke don't fix it.

Regards

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Postscript: The Blindfold thingy for Gold Members was cute while it lasted, but it would be nice if you could find a way to bring back my beloved DOUBLE TROUBLE. On another tact and in an attempt to temper some of the Fed Bashing, it should be noted that he did an excellent Repertoire book on the Benko gambit some years ago.        

   

you'll just love Fed's book on the English Attack. hahaha

To quote Markovich:
"You could imagine separate sections for (1) Najdorf-Sheveningen-Classical,  (2) Sveshnikov-Kalashnikov-Lowenthal,  (3) other including Kan-Taimanov-4 Knights."

which makes a lot of sense to me, if you could find the people to do it.  I am not so sure about Ward doing another Sicilian.  Does he play another Sicilian besides the Dragon?  If he doesn't, I think that puts the quality of the updates at a serious risk.  I think the playing experience adds a lot to the updates.  For example, I like seeing sections done by Prie, Mikhalevski, and Sherbakov for this perspective.  For example, it would be nice to see a Sheshnikov player cover the Sveshnikov.

In concurrance with dearlv, I don't think the switch makes sense unless it will mean an increase in timeliness and quality. Ward, though I enjoy his updates, is consistently tardy. The August update was released just a few weeks ago!! In addition, it will be more costly to subscribers if they want full coverage of the Sicilian defense.

If splitting up the sicilians would make the updates better, more in-depth, and more timely, I would definitely split up the sections. However, if you were to split sicilians up into 3 or 4 different sections, I think it might be nice to have a "Sicilians" option which would include the Anti-Sicilians and all of the Open Sicilians at one price.

Quote:


I suggested something similar some time ago:

Re: How good are the different sections?
on: 08/13/04 
"I've been a subscriber almost from the beginning and have watched with interest the various sections evolve. 
 
IMHO the weakest section BY FAR is the Open Sicilian section. This is partly down to the Fed himself, whose work-rate does not exactly  impress, but mainly down to the fact that, even with the Dragons in a separate section of their own, the Open Sicilian is just too big a topic for any one author to deal with properly.   
 
I therefore suggest that (at least) the "Rolls Royce" of Sicilians (the Najdorf, of course) should be given its own section in Chess Publishing and entrusted to an author who is an acknowledged expert in it. 
 
A similar case could also be made for a separate section for the clear No2 of Open Sicilians - the Sveshnikov."

But apparently there are technical problems in creating further sections, so I think Tony's suggestion of redistributing stuff between the two existing sections is a good idea. 

But would it really be fair to expect Chris Ward for instance to produce high-quality material on Sicilians that he doesn't play e.g. the Sveshnikov or the Najdorf? So perhaps a further step then could be to revise the workload within each of the two sections - (contracts etc. permitting) would it be possible for one or two new specialist "authors" to be recruited to share the workload in each of the two re-organised sections? [Hint: Tony himself has written a fine book on the Najdorf!]

I didn't mean the Forum division, but on ChessPublishing.com! The Dragons only covers B70-79 (and a few odds and ends) whilst Fed covers most of the rest from B30-B99.
I don't see what their being late has to do with anything?!